Albers embraces a new challenge
REGINA — Andrew Albers insists his major league journey isn’t over.
He’s just taking a bit of a detour.
The 28-year-old pitcher from North Battleford has negotiated a buyout of his contract with the Minnesota Twins and is expecting to complete a deal with the Hanwha Eagles of the Korean Professional Baseball League.
“It was an opportunity that came up just two weeks ago. It’s something that really happened quickly,” Albers said Tuesday at the Credit Union EventPlex in Regina, where he was instructing youngsters as part of the Cameco Dream and Believe camps.
“With the acquisitions the Twins made in the offseason, it was going to be difficult for me to make that roster out of camp. We discussed it and came to the conclusion that this was an opportunity they would let me pursue. There are some formalities that still have to occur before it becomes official official, but it’s probably going to happen in the next couple days.”
Albers was one of the feelgood stories in all of baseball last year during his lateseason stint in Minnesota. He did not allow a run in his first 17 1-3 innings — spanning two starts — including a complete-game two-hit shutout against the Cleveland Indians.
Albers finished the campaign with a 2-5 record and 4.05 earned-run average over 60 innings. In the process, he became the first Saskatchewan player to appear in the majors since Melville-born outfielder Terry Puhl finished his career with the Kansas City Royals in 1991.
It’s all part of an improbable journey for Albers, a substitute teacher and basketball coach in North Battleford during the off-season. He was selected in the 10th round of the 2008 MLB amateur draft by the San Diego Padres, who released him after arm issues, including Tommy John surgery.
Albers had a number of failed tryouts with major league teams and ended up playing independent ball in Quebec before he offered to pay his way to Florida for a spring training tryout with the Twins. He ended up earning a contract and was recently named the team’s minor-league pitcher of the year, posting an 11-5 record and 2.86 ERA with triple-A Rochester before the call-up.
“I kind of have a unique story of how I’ve gotten through and my ability to persevere through some ups and downs,” he said. “The message (to kids) is to believe in yourself and go after your dreams.”
Albers’s cumulative experiences — good and bad — had positioned him closer than ever to a full-time major league job. Then came an abrupt left turn — toward South Korea, of all places.
“It was a tough decision,” the soft-tossing lefty said. “Your dream as a kid is always to play in the major leagues. Part of the reason is you don’t know much about the other stuff. At the same time, I feel like this is another route I can take to get myself established.
“As far as the goals changing, no, not really. I would love to go over there for a year or two, have a great experience and come back and really establish myself over here as well. It might be a little bit of a roundabout way of doing it, but at the same time that goal doesn’t change.”
In the meantime, Albers is hoping to cash in with the Eagles, who will reportedly pay him in the high six figures — more than he would earn if he made the Twins’ roster.
While declining to discuss specifics, he said the financial benefits are “substantial.”
“Obviously as a baseball career goes on, that window of opportunity becomes shorter and shorter,” he said. “Your chance to really make a living out of it becomes less and less. From a financial standpoint, there was an opportunity there. There’s also some really good things that happen once I go over there with my contract and things like that. If I go over there for a year, I come back as a free agent. That’s a big deal if I can manage to do that and have a good year or two over there.”
That’s not to mention the appeal of experiencing a whole new baseball culture.
“I’m really looking forward to that part of it as well, going over there and getting to experience something completely different,” he added. “You get to go to a different part of the world. I’ve never been to Asia, so it should be interesting that way. There are a lot of things that played into it. It was a really difficult decision just based on how the Twins have treated me. They’ve given me an opportunity when no one else has. But at the end of the day, I felt it was something I just couldn’t pass up.”